Some of the region's biggest names in fintech have joined together at the launch of a  Community Interest Company.

Advised by Womble Bond Dickinson, Atom bank, Newcastle Building Society, Kani, and Teesside, Northumbria and Newcastle universities have joined FinPact, with a mandate to deliver a Fintech strategy for the North East.

Its overarching purpose is to create the ideal environment for innovation to thrive by focusing on digital, data and tech skills where finance has a part to play across multiple sectors of our lives, benefitting our region, its people and businesses.

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Steve Kevan of Finpact, says: ‘We invite all across the Finance related Digital, Data and Tech Communities here in the North East to engage with us and learn how working with us can help you develop your skills, grow your businesses, fast track your innovation and deliver impact.

"FinPact seeks to optimise the application, coordination and collaboration of resources into a series of building-blocks to create a thriving Enablement Engine”.

Leveraging the role of embedded finance in delivering cross-sector impact from problem statement to fully fitted use cases is central to the FinPact model.

Kevin Telford of Monstarlab and FinTech North, added: “While the North East faces structural challenges in areas such as education, productivity and poverty alleviation, we demonstrate success when our best minds and efforts align across industry led initiatives. We believe there is a major opportunity to enhance and harness the region's resources, around embedded finance innovation in support of transformational impacts across society, economy and environment (SEE).”

FinPact’s vision is for the North East to be recognised as a world class ecosystem, where our resources across the private sector, learning establishments, finance, the public sector and physical place are aligned and optimised so innovation can thrive, financial businesses can grow, and our people can prosper.

James Thwaites of Whitecap Consulting, enthused; “Working with great people and partners, through means of direct action and syndicating resources, FinPact can aim to create an internationally significant centre of excellence for Finance, Digital, Data and Tech.”

Usman Shahid of TrueNorth added: “Like other regions, North East England grapples with a significant digital skills gap, inhibiting its ability to align education with commercial skills demand to attract and retain top talent. Our goal is to excite those in education about creating impactful careers in Fin-related Digital, Data and Tech Innovation.

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"The North East has the potential to become a hotbed of innovation, but there are still low levels of entrepreneurship and fewer scale-ups. Development of an Innovation Pipeline Accelerator bridging the gap between students, intra/entrepreneurs and business could deliver a new way of working.

"The region boasts renowned academic institutions and forward-thinking corporations, harbouring vast intellectual capital. By addressing the digital skills gap, fostering innovation and impact, alongside showcasing the region's academic and corporate expertise, we can strive to solve some fundamental issues and deliver impact."